The Colorado Forest Service has designed an online tool that allows Summit County residents to assess the wildfire risk in their neighborhoods.

"We wanted to create awareness of wildfire risk for the individual who lives in Colorado," said Rich Homann, a staff forester with the Colorado Forest Service. "We also wanted to inform decision makers about the risk, so they could have information available to them to base decisions on and prioritize actions."

The Colorado Wildfire Risk Assessment, or CO-WRAP, allows Web visitors to view maps and download information about neighborhoods and watersheds.

The portal was created using GIS (geographic information systems) and combines information from fire departments, the National Weather Service, the U.S. Census Bureau and other sources to evaluate the risk of wildfire to individual homes.

"We wanted to gather as much information as possible from a lot of different sources and put it in one place where it was accessible for anybody who wanted to use it," Homann said.